When Westbury High School boys’ track coach, Donald Ross, received the news that he’d won the award for Section 8 “Track Coach of the Year,” he was sick with the flu. The longtime coach was surprised at the honor and he needed someone to pick up the award for him at the honorary dinner at the Crest Hollow Country Club.

“I’d already been to the fall awards dinner and to tell you the truth I wasn’t expecting to receive the honor,” said Ross, who has been coaching track and field for 35 years in the district. “I had a bug at the time and a couple of the other coaches picked up the award for me. But I’m very appreciative to earn this distinction.” [Read more…]

Paul Mila feels as much at home 80 feet under sea level than he does in his Carle Place home. Over the last 16 years, he’s been diving all over the world and he recently took a look back at his exhilarating diving career in his new book, Bubbles Up.

Mila’s first foray into diving happened while on a trip to Cozumel, Mexico with his neighbors. He fell in love with it after his first try.

“I liked the initial lesson in the pool and then we did a beach dive, and then did the boat dive a few miles off shore,” Mila says. “It was clear and warm and there was a ton of sea life. It was mind boggling. I finished the dive and said ‘I have to do this.’” [Read more…]

Kristen Doherty is a bowling pin’s worst enemy. The Carle Place High School sophomore and varsity bowler competed this past Sunday, March 8, in the state bowling championships in Syracuse, helping the Nassau County team/ Section VIII team come in fourth place.

Her high game was a 226 and her overall average was a 178.

“I’m pretty pretty proud of how I did because my average was higher than my average during the season,” Doherty said. “My team was really supportive and kept me calm throughout the six games as well as my coach.” [Read more…]

Westbury High School senior and varsity wrestler Raeco Jackson finished second in the Section VIII Wrestling Championship on Feb. 15 at Hofstra University. This finish, coupled with his first place finish the previous season, earned him an at large bid to compete in the NYSPHSAA Wrestling Championship in Albany at the Times Union Center on Feb. 27 and 28. [Read more…]

The Carle Place Girls Varisty Basketball team has been a tough, aggressive bunch all season and that tenacity showed in their comeback win against Hampton Bays in the Long Island Championship game at LIU Post on Monday night. After being down all game, Carle Place took over in the fourth quarter to win in a nail biter 36-32. Senior guard, Sarah Pisani and junior point guard, Kacey Burden were instrumental in their team’s win. [Read more…]

The 6th grade Our Lady of Hope girls’ basketball team of Carle Place won its second consecutive Long Island Championship recently by defeating St. Agnes of Rockville Centre 39-30. Last year as fifth graders they won the ‘B’ championship and this year they moved up into the elite ‘A’ division and took top honors. With approximately 100 teams competing at the seventh grade level Island-wide, this is quite an accomplishment! Congratulations to the girls on a great season. [Read more…]

The 5th grade Our Lady of Hope girls basketball team from Carle Place won the ‘B’ Division Long Island Championship this season. They beat St. Philips of Northport 22-18 in the championship game.Congratulations to the team, they improved and played extremely hard all season. [Read more…]

Westbury’s Kaitlyn Kieser, a junior at SUNY Oneonta on the track and field team, was named athlete of the week after she recently helped to lead the women to a second place finish at the Eagle Invitational hosted by SUNY Brockport.

Kieser set a school record in the long jump when she won the event with a meet record leap. Her distance of 5.45m broke the previous meet mark of 5.44m. She surpassed the old school record of 5.30m set by teammate Michelle Chartrand.

Kieser’s mark was also good enough to qualify for the ECAC championship meet during the first weekend of March.

In what turned out to be a heck of a game, the Green Dragons boys basketball team fought hard to force overtime but ended up losing to the home team, Freeport, 68-59 in Thursday’s playoff quarterfinals game at Freeport High School.

The game started off at a fast clip as both teams tried to feel each other out in the early going. The Roughriders found the outside shooting touch early and their size and strength made it difficult for Westbury to get points in the paint. With Freeport taking the 19-14 lead at the end of the first quarter, the Green Dragons needed to figure out a way to get points without having to force shots inside. [Read more…]